Sky

FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT SKY - PAGE 2

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- After seven years of frustration, Canadian racing may find itself Saturday afternoon with a Breeders` Cup champion. Despite entering a good number of horses in the Breeders` Cup, including Triple Crown winners With Approval and Izvestia, the Canadians have not been able to win a Cup event. They came close in 1987, when Regal Classic lost the Juvenile by two lengths, but they haven`t come that close since. The outlook is better with Distaff favorite Dance Smartly and Turf favorite Sky Classic, both owned by Ernie Samuel`s Sam-Son Farm and trained by James Day. Dance Smartly, third in last year`s Juvenile Fillies, has won all seven of her races this year, including the Molson Million against the males in her last start.

Every morning I get up, have a cup of coffee, read the South Florida Sun-Sentinel and look out over the lake at our beautiful blue Florida skies. Except on Jan. 15, there was a northwest wind of cool dry air. Creeping in with the breeze was a brown layer of smoke that covered the sky like pollution you would have seen 30 years ago in any polluted northern town of that time. How long are we going to allow the sugar industry to pollute our sky and water? I know, you will hear the pitch from the guys in Palm Beach County that sugar creates jobs.

For most people, a tree or a light pole works to post a reward sign. But for Bob Benyo, the sky is the limit when it comes to alerting the world someone stole his laptop and he's willing to pay for its return. Benyo, who owns an airplane advertising business, had one of his pilots fly circles over Hollywood on Thursday, towing a jumbo-sized reward offer on a banner: "Stolen Sony laptop reward $1,500. Call 1-800-FLY-7001." A Hollywood police report says someone broke into Benyo's H2 Hummer on Sunday and ran off with his Sony Vaio laptop, worth about $3,500.

Despite big stars, an all-American theme and an important director in the late Tony Richardson, Blue Sky almost didn't make it to theaters. This 3-year-old film from troubled Orion Pictures was destined for video store shelves, until it recently tested well outside major cities. The film is quite good, with seldom-seen Jessica Lange as Carly, a vamp in the Monroe mode, and Tommy Lee Jones as her husband, Maj. Hank Marshall. The performances are exceptionally strong, down to the young actresses who play their wryly observant daughters Alex (Amy Locane)

The northern lights came south on Monday night, filling portions of Florida`s skies with a mysterious pinkish-red glow. In Palm Beach and Broward counties, residents who were alarmed by the unusual celestial display telephoned police departments, weather and marine agencies. "The pink color in the sky was none other than the northern lights, also known as aurora borealis," said Gordon McCann, a weather specialist at the National Weather Service at Palm Beach International Airport. "That is extremely rare this far south."

When it comes to meteor showers, Fort Lauderdale astronomer Arnold Pearlstein is like Joe Btfsplk, the Li'l Abner comic strip character who always had a cloud over his head. Clouds make finding shooting stars close to impossible. About a dozen people milled around the beach at Lauderdale-by-the-Sea to look at the Geminids meteor shower with Pearlstein on Monday. They found the early evening sky cloudy - especially in the area where the meteor showers would be most visible. Bolan Tarkoe, 4, asked her mom, "Where's the meteor shower?"

Microsoft Corp. may pay more than $1 billion for a 3.5 percent stake in News Corp.'s Sky Global Networks, the world's No. 1 satellite TV company, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. The world's biggest software maker and Rupert Murdoch's media group are in talks that "are progressing smoothly," the paper said. Spokesmen Rick Miller at Microsoft and Andrew Butcher at News Corp. wouldn't comment. An investment by Microsoft may make Sky Global more attractive to investors as it prepares for an initial share sale this quarter.

HALLANDALE -- Staring down his shedrow on a quiet morning this week on Gulfstream Park`s backside, trainer Bill Mott reflected on Fraise`s chances in Saturday`s $2 million Turf. Fraise had won more than $390,000 this year, but had lost his last race, Belmont`s Turf Classic, by nearly two lengths to Sky Classic. And not only was Sky Classic entered in Saturday`s Turf, but the race would also include Arc de Triomphe winner Subotica and Man o`War victor Solar Splendor. Fraise was good. Would he be good enough?

Boca Raton-based Sky Scientific, the precious metals mining and processing subsidiary of Winners Circle Inc., recently announced the opening of an office in the financial district of Geneva, Switzerland. The company also said it appointed Katharina Weibel as its international financial relations director. Weibel, a native of Switzerland, was formerly with Citicorp and Shearson Lehman. Suburban Bankshares reports loss Lake Worth-based Suburban Bankshares recently reported a loss of $84,000, or 10 cents a share, compared with profits of $6,000, or 1 cent a share, for the second quarter of 1992.

One federal retiree would like some of that pie in sky I must strongly object to that ridiculous letter from a Margate reader stating how retired federal employees are getting rich on their pensions. The only people I know who are receiving these large pensions are retired congressmen or retired executives. I am a retired federal employee and I would like a slice of the pie-in-the-sky pension this writer talks about. This is the real world we're living in. LEONARD HOLT Boca Raton